An LA's Writers' Lab Writing Exercise in Fear

Because our fears are often mirrored by those of our protagonist’s, Alan Watt of the LA Writers’ Lab has come up with what he calls the Fear Exercise. It goes something like this: write for five minutes as fast as you can starting with “I’m afraid to write this story because. . .” He recommends making a list of as many fears as you can think of. The following is his list from his book The 90-day Novel of the possible fears you may have:

·         I will fail.

·         I will succeed.

·         My family will hate me.

·         I will discover that I am not really a writer.

·         I will discover that I am a writer and then I’ll have to keep doing this.

·         I will die.

·         I am wasting my time.

·         I am not good enough.

·         It will be superficial.

·         I won’t be able to figure it out.

·         I won’t do it right.

·         I will find out I am a bad person.

·         Nobody will care.

·         I will be alone.

Whatever your fears, most writers have them. You may even find that some of your fears correspond to those of your protagonist. Just don’t let your fears stand in the way of your writing. In fact, let them motivate you and even enhance your story. Your readers will be able to relate to your fear. Watt makes this point when he writes, “If we give ourselves permission to write from this raw, vulnerable place, our work becomes relatable.” Don’t fear your fear when beginning your novel, embrace it.  

Two Tips for Beginning Your Character-driven Novel

Sometimes you will find yourself needing to establish the fact that your protagonist is different from the normal Joe.  So how do you do this effectively, without going into a long exposition of why this character doesn’t fit the norm?  One way is to use another character in the first scene along with the protagonist who fits what we would describe as normal.  Sir Arthur Conan Doyle did this with Doctor Watson in the Sherlock Holmes series. 

 

To illustrate, here is a passage from the first scene in “A Scandal in Bohemia” from Adventures of Sherlock Holmes:

I had seen little of Homes lately.  My marriage had drifted us away from each other.  My own complete happiness, and the home-centered interests which rise up around the man who first finds himself master of his own establishment, were sufficient to absorb all my attention; while Holmes, who loathed every form of society with his whole Bohemian soul, remained in our lodgings in Baker-street, buried among his old books, alternating from week to week between cocaine and ambition, the drowsiness of the drug, and the fierce energy of his own keen nature.  He was still, as ever, deeply attracted by the study of crime, and occupied his immense faculties and extraordinary powers of observation in following out those clues, and clearing up those mysteries, which had been abandoned as hopeless by the official police.

Here Doyle shows us Sherlock Holmes by contrasting him with Dr. Watson.  He lets the reader know upfront that Sherlock Holmes does not conform to the cultural norms of the day, as Dr. Watson apparently does.  Holmes has no desire for wife and family, but possesses an incredible passion for solving crime.

Another way you can establish that your lead character is different from the rest is by placing him or her in a situation and have that person react in an unusual way. Charles Dickens did it with Scrooge in his novel A Christmas Carol.  Dickens places him in the counting house on Christmas Eve where he gives his kind visiting nephew a bah humbug and two men collecting money for the poor a lecture on why the poor are not getting any of his money.  The following passage gives us even more insight into his rather unlikable personality.  Here we see how he reacts to a Christmas caroler and his clerk who wants Christmas day off:  

Foggier yet, and colder! Piercing, searching, biting cold. If the good Saint Dunstan had but nipped the Evil Spirit's nose with a touch of such weather as that, instead of using his familiar weapons, then indeed he would have roared to lusty purpose. The owner of one scant young nose, gnawed and mumbled by the hungry cold as bones are gnawed by dogs, stooped down at Scrooge's keyhole to regale him with a Christmas carol: but at the first sound of God bless you, merry gentleman! May nothing you dismay! Scrooge seized the ruler with such energy of action that the singer fled in terror, leaving the keyhole to the fog and even more congenial frost.

At length the hour of shutting up the counting-house arrived. With an ill-will Scrooge dismounted from his stool, and tacitly admitted the fact to the expectant clerk in the Tank, who instantly snuffed his candle out, and put on his hat.

``You'll want all day tomorrow, I suppose?'' said Scrooge.

``If quite convenient, Sir.''

``It's not convenient,'' said Scrooge, ``and it's not fair. If I was to stop half-a-crown for it, you'd think yourself ill-used, I 'll be bound?''

The clerk smiled faintly.

``And yet,'' said Scrooge, ``you don't think me ill-used, when I pay a day's wages for no work.''

The clerk observed that it was only once a year.

``A poor excuse for picking a man's pocket every twenty-fifth of December!'' said Scrooge, buttoning his great-coat to the chin. ``But I suppose you must have the whole day. Be here all the earlier next morning!''

Dickens shows us what kind of character Scrooge is by having him react to the people around him.  Through his reactions and comments we get an excellent idea of who he is.  Dickens leaves no question in the reader’s mind that Scrooge is, well, a scrooge.
  
Character-driven plots are often driven by characters that are different in some way.  So if you find yourself needing to establish this difference, either create a normal character you can contrast your protagonist with or place your character in a situation that allows his or her idiosyncrasies to shine through.

Novel Beginnings: Deciding on Viewpoint

One of the most important things you must decide when beginning your novel or short story is deciding which character or characters you are going to view the story through.  I call it deciding on which pair or pairs of eyes you want to see the story with.  There are basically three types of viewpoints (it can get more complex) in fiction writing:  the omniscient viewpoint, single character viewpoint, and dual or multicharacter viewpoint. 

With the omniscient viewpoint, the author writes from the perspective of the removed observer.  This viewpoint allows the author to get into all the characters’ heads at once.  This viewpoint is the least engaging and should be used sparingly.  I will write more about viewpoint in future blogs.  For now here is an example of the omniscient viewpoint from Gary Colvin’s novel, The Last Fisherman: 

The Whalehead trolling drag lay only thirty yards outside the shoreline.  It allowed Jim and Sammy to view an intriguing rocky beach and dense forest all day long.  A family of Bald Eagles on the island also added their daily activities to the enjoyment of the two fishermen.  One moment the big birds sat majestically on a perch, and the next moment they soared gracefully through the air with extended talons to catch fish.

While the observation of nature in action brought pleasure to the fishermen, the trolling drag also produced good catches of salmon.  When Laurs appeared on the scene the first week in August, the crew on the Miss Laura knew they had chosen the right spot.

In this passage we find that we are viewing the story through the eyes of a distant narrator who seems to know what is going on inside the heads of both characters and tells us.  We know that both fishermen enjoyed the Bald Eagles and that they knew that they had chosen the right spot. 

 

On the other hand, single character viewpoint simply means that you are viewing the story through the eyes of one particular character, usually the protagonist.  Here is an example from the novel Try Darkness by James Scott Bell:

I stopped off at the Ultimate Sip.  Pick McNitt made me what he called a Darwinian. “If you can survive this, you’re one of the fittest.”

It was like all the espresso beans in Los Angeles in a single cup.

“Wow,” I said.

“Exactly,” McNitt said.  His big moon face was beaming under his snowy beard. “You think it’ll sell?”

“Oh yeah,” What’re you going to charge?”

“Five bucks.”

“A little high, isn’t it?”

“All the writers will buy it. I’ll tell ‘em they can be the next Balzac.”

“Balzac?”

“You know Balzac. Guy drank about forty cups of black coffee a day. Had his servants wake him up at midnight, got to his writing table, and wrote until exhausted. Then he’d start with coffee and keep going.  Wrote a hundred books that way. Before the age of fifty-one.”

“What happened when he turned fifty-one?”

“Died”

“How?”

“Caffeine poisoning.”

“Ah.”  I took one more sip and started to feel like I could jump over the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum.

Notice that Bell never lets us know what McNitt is thinking or observing, only what he says.  We are not allowed into McNitt’s mind because he is not the viewpoint character, Ty the protagonist is.  It is through Ty’s eyes that we see McNitt’s moon face and snowy beard and know how Ty feels after his last sip of coffee.

Deciding upon whose eyes you want your reader to see your story through should be done before you begin writing to save you a few headaches.  Of course, there is always room for a change of mind throughout the process.

   

In my next blog, I will discuss handling multiple viewpoints within the same story.